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Monday, March 28, 2016

Contributed by Tatyana Kleyn, The City College of
New York and Director & Producer of Una
Vida, Dos Países (One Life, Two Countries)

Una Vida, Dos Países:
Children and Youth (Back) in Mexico is a 30 minute documentary film with free
educator resources that explore the experiences of US born or raised students
who have spent all or most of their lives in the US and returned with their family
to Oaxaca, Mexico. The film is a rich teaching tool for conversations in
schools about immigration and identity. Read a recent New York Times article
featuring the film.

We
drove for four days through California, New Mexico and Arizona to get to the El
Paso, Texas border [with Mexico]. There I spent my last moments in the US.
I turned around and said, “I will be back, I don’t know when, but it’s a
promise.” I took my last breath on that side of the border and turned around,
leaving not just friends and family, but a life I will never forget. - Melchor,
17 years old

People from all over the world
dream about migration to the United States for “a better life.”Some receive permission from the US
government to immigrate, in the form of a green card or visa.Others cross into the country without papers when
it is nearly impossible for them to attain the required permission.Currently, there are more than 11 million
people in the US who are unauthorized, who are the topic of contentious
immigration debates in our country. Melchor
(quoted above) and his family were a part this subcategory of migrants during
their 10 years in the US.

While we hear a lot about
immigrants coming to the US, less is known about what happens when they
leave.The discourse is often around
deportations and the rising numbers of individuals the government forces to
return to their country of origin.However, other families who are in the US without papers find that
circumstances related to living undocumented also force them to return.This phenomenon reminds us that migration is
not a linear process, but a cyclical one.

Aside from deportations,
there are a range of reasons families make the difficult decision to
return.These include: reuniting with elderly
family members they have not seen in years (or those their children have not
even met); medical issues that require long-term healthcare that undocumented
immigrants cannot access in most states in the US; discrimination via state policies
that prohibit undocumented immigrants from accessing drivers licenses, being
banned from attending college or receiving financial aid; racism and xenophobia
that many immigrants of color face on a regular basis; and the economic struggles
of supporting a family while living in the shadows and being exploited of by
the labor system.

In order to share the stories
of these returned families, and to focus on their US born and raised children, I
was part of a team - with Ben Donnellon, William Perez and Rafael Vásquez - that
created a short documentary to delve into these phenomena.Una
Vida, Dos Países: Children and Youth (Back) in Mexico explores how elementary
and secondary students struggle with their identity, language learning and loss,
and schooling.The film shows some of
the benefits of being “back”-such as meeting grandparents and enjoying delicious
fresh Mexican food, but it also shares the challenges that returning youth face
- fitting in, using Spanish for academic purposes, communicating with family
who speak indigenous languages, and the economic struggles that make education
an obstacle for them.

A group of transborder high school students, who call themselves “The
New Dreamers,” meet to discuss the realities and challenges of being back in
Mexico. Photo Credit: Ben Donnellon

The goals of the film are to
raise awareness about this growing population of students, some of whom are
dual US and Mexican citizens.The film
is also accompanied by a Spanish-English bilingual curriculum for secondary
schools in the US, Mexico and beyond.The lessons prepare the students to watch the film and to delve deeper
into the areas of identity, language, economics and policies.

A resource guide for
educators in Mexico, whose students cross literal and figurative borders
throughout their lives, also accompanies the documentary. These include the
most obvious border, the artificial division between the US and Mexico, in
addition to borders that are crossed from one state to another while living in
the US. Another border students cross
daily is languages, such as English, Spanish and in the case of some of the families
in the film, Zapotec (an indigenous language spoken in certain parts of Mexico).These students also cross cultural borders as
well as those across school systems.For
all these reasons I use Lynn Stephen’s (2007) term transborder to describe them.

Because these students are
now (back) in Mexico does not mean that is where they will stay.Those who are dual citizens of the US and
Mexico, (if they were born in the US to at least one Mexican citizen parent),
can freely travel between the two nations as long as their documentation is up
to date. Many who were undocumented in
the US, still see that country as their home, and many hope to return.However, applying and receiving papers or
crossing countries’ border without authorization again are both tremendously costly
and difficult for Mexicans.But
regardless of where they will be in the future - the US, Mexico or another
nation - they bring with them a wealth of resources including their
multilingualism, cross-cultural capabilities and in-depth understanding of how
national and transnational policies – or the absence of them – impacts people
at the most human level.

César
Chávez was a Mexican-American labor activist and civil rights leader who fought
tirelessly throughout his life to improve the working conditions of migrant
farm workers. A man of great courage, he championed nonviolent protest, using
boycotts, strikes, and fasting as a way to create sweeping social change. Importantly,
his work led him to found the United Farm Workers union (UFW).

His
remarkable achievements towards social justice and human rights serve as an excellent
example to young people of how vital their voices are in bringing about change
and championing causes that are as relevant today as they were in his day.

Thursday,
March 31st is César Chávez Day, a day aimed at celebrating the life
and work of this remarkable individual through education and community service.

In
this immigration lesson
plan, students will understand how César Chávez’s adolescence as a migrant
farm worker influenced his later achievements.First, students will analyze how an artist and biographer have
interpreted Chávez’s legacy.Then by
reading excerpts from Chávez’s autobiography, students will draw connections
between how his early years shaped his later beliefs and achievements around
organized labor, social justice, and humane treatment of individuals. Once
students have read and critically thought about these connections, they will
write a response supported with evidence from the text to answer the
investigative question on the impact of Chávez’s early years and
development.This Common-Core and C3 aligned
lesson includes extensions and adaptations for ELL students and readers at
multiple levels.

Amelia's Road by Linda
Jacobs Altman explores the daily life of migrant farm working in California's
Central Valley from a child’s perspective. According to the publisher, Lee and
Low Books, “it is an inspirational tale about the importance of home.”

First Day in Grapes by L. King Perez follows
Chico and his family traveling farm to farm across California where every
September they pick grapes and Chico enters a different school. But third grade
year is different and Chico begins to find his own voice against the bullies at
his school.

Calling the Doves / El Canto de las Palomas by Juan Herrera is the current Poet Laureate’s account of his childhood
as a migrant farmworker.Beautifully
illustrated and
composed in Spanish and English,
Herrera describes the simple joys he misses from his native Mexico as well as
detailing his personal journey in becoming a writer.

A brief video Mini-Bio:
César Chávez sets the foundation for older
students to learn about the major achievements of Chávez’s life.

Initiate a community service
project

Chávez
was explicit about the need to serve one’s community. As a class, identify a
need in your community and then brainstorm ways that students can make a
difference from running a donation drive to decorating school walls in order to
welcome all students and families.Take inspiration
from a group of middle school students in Fellsmere, FL for a more intensive
service-learning project. They wrote and produced a short news broadcast highlighting
the unfair labor practices and strenuous conditions of migrant farmworkers who
pick oranges in their community. Then they held a school-wide donation drive
for materials farmworkers sorely needed. Their teachers were winners of our
Community Grants program and a lesson for this project can be found here.If
you do decide to do an immigration-themed service-learning project, please let us know about it and apply for our community grants (deadline July 1,
2016).